"Jom kosam, waru gaa!" Milkmaids, come over here!

In a Fulfulde grammar book I once came across the 'polite imperative', equivalent to our use of the word 'please', but I have never heard it actually used here, except in prayers. Requests and commands amongst the Fulani are always abrupt, and offence is neither meant nor taken.

There are five men in the rice field, standing ankle deep in the mud and shallow water. Four are bent double, pulling out grass from amongst the young rice plants. The other one, Aadama, is standing up and beckoning the milk girls theatrically.

"Waru gaa, mi sippan kosam!" The verb sippude means to buy milk. There is another word, sonnude, for buying anything but milk. In a culture centred on the cow as the source of life and security, milk is very special. Milk is much more than a food, milk is fellowship. It is a celebration. And it is very welcome when you are weeding a rice field. The girls set off towards the workers. Their hips sway as they walk but their calabashes stay absolutely on a level.

Aadama bends down again and begins plucking out rosettes of tough grass, one at a time. Aadama is not strictly Fulani but he grew up herding cattle in a Fulani region and he speaks fluent Fulfulde. He is darker-skinned than his Fulani co-workers here, and also considerably less reserved.

True Fulani have traditionally found their identity in pulaaku, a code of honour which forbids a Fulani to be extrovert in his behaviour, in particular that he should not show any kind of need or weakness. This would therefore preclude any expression of grief, physical pain, affection, hunger or thirst. It would forbid him, for example, to yell across seven rice fields that he needs some milk.

But times are changing for the Fulani. That these cattle-herders are working in a rice field at all is evidence of that. Not long ago a Fulani would have experienced deep shame in his community if he deigned to cultivate the land. But needs must. There are few families these days who can rely purely on their cattle for survival, and even fewer who are able to sustain the traditional nomadic lifestyle.

As the ideal of the honourable, self-sufficient herder has diminished in the Fulani sense of identity, so too pulaaku has loosened its grip on Fulani behaviour. This is just as well; working rice without the outlet of occasionally groaning "Aah, my back!" must indeed be an exquisite form of torture. Similarly, when Aadama shouts that he wants a bowl of milk, his Fulani friends guffaw but they do not despise him for it. He is only saying what everyone else is thinking.

The girls arrive at the edge of the field and hesitate. The silver coins they wear in their jet-black hair glint in the sun. Aadama straightens up and runs across the field towards them, slipping and sliding in the mud.

"Taa yaaba maaro!" calls out one of the workers, Ousmana, chortling. Don't tread on the rice. Reaching the edge of the field, Aadama leaps up onto the bank of the irrigation canal. He loses his footing and with a loud cry of dismay plunges headlong into the shallow water. Hearing the cry and the splash, the workers look up and see two mud-caked feet flailing in the air. They laugh. Aadama gets up and glares at the spot on the bank where he slipped. Then he strolls nonchalantly over to the milk girls, grins at them from ear to ear and proffers a small coin.

These girls are selling kosam daaniidam, literally 'milk that has slept'. It is yesterday's milk, left to stand overnight and then whisked with a twig. It tastes sour, as you would expect, but is more filling than kosam biraadam ('milked milk').

Holding his bowl of daaniidam, Aadama steps down into the field again and picks his way gingerly across to the group. "Ndiyam naati hoore am," he complains, holding out the bowl to Ousmana. Water has got inside my head. Ousmana laughs, takes the bowl gratefully and sips. When he hands the bowl back, Aadama gestures for him to drink more, but he just says, "Mi haari" - I am full. Pulaaku is not dead yet.

When everyone has drunk, the girls lift their calabashes onto their heads and move off in search of other thirsty workers. The Fulani men bend down and continue their slow progress across the field. By now the sun is high in the sky and the water in the field is getting hot. Someone suggests using it to make tea, and they chuckle.

Suffering in the heat, Ousmana begins to sing in a low voice, pulling weeds to the beat of his song.
"Mo gollaay tampata," (He who works not tires not)
"Mo tampaay hebata," (He who tires not gains not)
"Mo hebaay nyaamata," (He who gains not eats not)
"Mo nyaamaay fowtata." (He who eats not rests not)

Working in the rice fields is physically harder than herding cattle. But for each of these Fulani men, the rice they gain should feed their families for the next six months at least. If they sacrifice tradition to that end, where is the dishonour in that?